(Some) Stupid Nasty Neutered Male Dogs (lots are lovely too :-) )

It's true about other competitive outlets having more entire dogs, I forgot about that. There were just as many intact males, maybe more, as neutered in our rally classes. But, here's an example of how hard it can be to lookout for, diagnose, prevent, train against this happening. A big neutered, pretty advanced in his trials, going off leash and honouring, GSD badly mauled a young intact Toller and the Toller's owner when the owner threw himself on top of his dog.

Why did it happen? The Toller was just past one so probably at the peak of his testosterone levels. The GSD was known to his owner to have prey drive issues with small running critters, though in this case the Toller was not running but he was much smaller. Oban never had any trouble with that GSD, but Oban was older and bigger than the Toller. Another class member with a 2 year old intact male Field Spaniel did have trouble with the GSD. Again the FS was younger and smaller. Which was the greater prompt for the GSD to attack? Well, we'll never know. The GSD is banned from the training facility and any CKC event. His owner still trials her spayed female GSD, has made impressive strides with the girl and is a knowledgable and attentive owner all of us liked and respected. That it could be her dog that did this is pretty darn scary.

 

The same way that this owner of a young, un-neutered dog is trying to work through his issues. If your dog has issues with others, I don't think it matters whether his nads are attached to his body or in a jar somewhere

OK, that's flippant, because I know that you do have issues where entire dogs can be excluded, as you said, but there are always opportunities for training classes where all dogs are welcome. Just because Shadow didn't get along with a couple of the boys at our recent training session, it didn't mean we were excluded; we just worked on keeping him focussed on J (his handler) rather than them. Some might see this as glossing over the issue, but, for me, it's not important that my dog can play with unknown male dogs. It's important that I can keep him focussed enough on me to ignore them, come away from them and not start anything untoward. So, that's what we're working on.

 

I have read anecdotal articles about the increase in reactivity in neutered dogs, and rebuttals against, but it certainly ranks as one of my reasons for keeping Shadow entire. He was so jumpy and fearful as a young puppy, and as much as I think the increase in testosterone has helped his confidence no end, that skittishness is still lurking under the surface. I saw it yesterday morning when going in an unusual lift, and I had to spend a while getting him to chill out afterwards. I would be concerned that, if I did anything to lower his testosterone levels, that he would revert to a scared little man, and that would only make him more likely to be reactive to other dogs, out of fear.

 

At any gundog training sessions I have been to, bitches in heat (except for the three 'on point' days) are welcome at training sessions, and even at some examinations, though not at working tests. The idea is that entire male dogs need to concentrate on the work in hand and not be distracted by a bitch in season. Amazingly, it works.

Most dogs I know who work are entire. Not sure why this is, but it is indeed so. There are also a couple I know who are neutered, and I have never noticed a problem between them and other male dogs. Again, I assume it is because they are trained to focus on the work in hand, and not on having a bust-up with another dog.

One of the things I love about our training classes is that the dogs all seem to get along together. It is very, very rare for there to be a problem. And I find it amazing at working tests, where there may be 50 dogs all together, lying under the tables and lounging around after the test is finished, with never a cross word between them, whether they be intact or neutered, male or female. It's wonderful, I love it.

 

This is a very typical experience I have shown in the vid. Common enough for there to be quite a few examples on my gopro footage.

My intact dog meets a neutered dog, they say hello and have a sniff of each other - in this video, neither dog is completely relaxed, both are a little stiff, but tails are wagging and there is nothing particularly alarming about the meet and greet. My intact dog then moves off to go about his business - the neutered dog has noticed something he doesn't like. Most probably the way Charlie smells I should think, and then has a go, while my dog is facing the other way. And the owner confirm the dog does this with intact dogs but not other dogs.

If that owner wanted to train her dog not to do this, she'd struggle to find the owner of any intact dog willing to co-operate. I certainly wouldn't. So she is pretty much stuck doing what she is doing, grabbing her dog as soon as she spots an intact dog, so her dog is never going to be 'trained' to do anything other than what he does now.

[vid]

meeting a neutered dog by julieandcharlie julieandcharlie, on Flickr

 

It's much more likely to be because the neutered dogs are surrounded by entire dogs often and are extremely well socialised to them. This is not the case for most pet dogs.

 

If you ask me, the problem there was directly caused by the woman trying to grab her dog. If she'd left him alone and if the two of you had just walked on and ignored them, they'd have been fine. Not that it was a problem, but they just needed to sniff and find out who each other are. I don't think that has anything to do with one dog being intact and the other not; that looked like a fairly normal boy/boy meet and greet to me. A little bit stiff and uncomfortable, but both dogs being prepared to be friendly. The other dog coming up (three is often a difficult number) and then the owner getting in the action is what tipped the balance a bit, I think.

 

I agree, laid back owners generally = laid back dogs

 

And the owner saying her dog does this with all intact dogs? That's explained away by.......?

 

I don't know Julie, it's obviously a problem you encounter quite a lot, and I'm not trying to explain anything away. It's just that I personally have never really noticed an issue of aggression from neutered dogs specifically towards entire dogs. On the contrary, I had two entire dogs for many many years, and to be honest I would say the main problem they had was with other entire dogs, not with neutered dogs. And thinking about the dogs in my street, where there is an even split between entire and neutered males, any problems are more character related than entire/neutered issues.

 

If you live in a country or an area where most dogs are entire, or there is an even split of entire/neutered dogs, then neutered dogs are a lot more likely to be well socialised to entire dogs.

My own feeling on this is that there is something about neutering dogs that increases their reactivity to intact dogs (whether that's to the smell of intact dogs, or just the way intact dogs are - they way they look, stand or whatever) - it might be as simple as there is a slight increase in general reactivity post neutering, and normal socialisation over comes that for most things, but if you don't have a lot of entire dogs around it becomes a problem in that area.

 

I find this incredible. In season bitches are not welcome in class or shooting everywhere I've been. I have yet to see a male dog from pet gundogs to open standard dogs that are unaffected by in season bitches. A beautiful Goldie came to training as she had only just started her season and the trainer (who I only went to this once) said she could come. He got his open trials lab out to demo something and the dogs couldn't get his nose off the ground. It took him four goes to get a straight line out of his dog which would have been drilled to the nth degree and lived in kennels where there would be in season bitches around. Needless to say Riley was pretty distracted to the point the Goldie owner felt the need to apolgise. I told her not to worry of course it was far from the end of the world and we got plenty out of the training includingworking around a massive distraction but it really isn't common for bitches in heat to come to training and in our class the girls all stay home for three weeks.

I do definitely agree though that many dogs I meet working are intact and all get along together perfectly well. Any disagreements are very short lived and it's generally girls sorting everyone out to their satisfaction and then peace reigns. I wonder if the socialization they go through of being bundled into trucks and trailers together along with the focus on the work has a lot to do with it.

I can't imagine many pet dogs are put in close proximity to unknown dogs on a regular basis unless they do some kind of regular class or sport.

 

Truly, it works fine. And there was a bitch on heat at the hunting exam I went to the other week, and an entire male there too. There was no issue or problem - the dog and the bitch in question were just put at separate ends of the line during the walk up and drive. Most trainers I go to say that it is not a problem to have a bitch in heat during training classes either - except during the three days when they are actually receptive.

While we were looking for a stud dog I visited one breeder who has four bitches and one male dog. She says they all live together in the house, even when the bitches are in season, and she only separates them during the three days.

 

I think as with the original topic. If exposure is continuous it probably can be dealt with. I would spend a lot of time out of class or doing really simple things as Riley wouldn't cope, exposure just doesn't happen here as everyone is expected to leave their in season dogs at home.

There are plenty of people who have intact male and female dogs and manage perfectly well, that doesn't mean the performance of the male dogs isn't affected though. I also know of some male dogs who haven't done well in kennels because they can't cope with the in season girls being around.

I don't think it's hard to find anecdotes to support either side of this or the neutering argument and while I don't like generalisations I think it is important to recognise common problems for groups of dogs. It may be that the neueter/intact issue only occurs in cities where many unknown dogs are forced into contact with each other or really remote environments where socialisation options are limited but those factors should be identified and the issue recognised and some options suggested to help.

 

JulieT I can't see the video. I can get to Flicker where there is a big list of videos you've put up. Can you tell me which one it is there?

"If exposure is continuous it probably can be dealt with." We have found this to some extent with one of these neutered dogs. My neighbour often has his own big Lab and the boy's littermate brother (that belongs to his son) and we meet by chance walking in the bush. The son's dog is intact male aggressive. The dogs will actually meet, sniff, even play and then later in the walk, often when Oban is occupied with a good sniff in the grass, the dog will nail him. Or he'll try to. Now we watch out but it can be tricky because this dog is sneaky about it, as if he knows the man is going to yell at him. But as time went on it seemed the dog got used to meeting Oban and gave up on bothering with him. The owner is pretty careful, he knows his son's dog is like that and there are enough intact males in our village he's had ample chance to see it's only the intact ones it's a problem with. Maybe less so with the others as well now.

 

You do seem to be remarkably unlucky with the number of aggresive dogs you encounter!!

 

I know, it can seem that way. To me too, especially after +16 years of having an intact male and not even knowing about this. I do have to wonder if Oban is responsible, not intentionally, but somehow. Oban is quite a self confident dog. He avoids engaging with these dogs but he gives off an air of being very sure of himself. Maybe this sets some off? Who knows. You see my OP concern though, wondering if this will change with him when he is neutered.

 

Huh. I'll have a look - it should link through to the right one, and seemed to work earlier. I have a problem with my settings on flickr, I think. I'm forever losing the links I post on the forum.

 

Charlie has a fair amount of exposure to in-season bitches. Not of my choosing, but we encounter them so often, he is pretty much used to them. Even so, I'd NEVER get him to work around them.

Just last weekend, I was stood with a friend at the side of a (extremely quiet) country carpark, working on placeboards, and a young Viszla bitch bounced up. Charlie was on lead, and nearly strangled himself to get to this dog. I was absolutely taken aback - he hasn't acted like this since he was a stupid teenager. The owner, casually putting his other dog in his car, called over "oh, she is in season, it's her first one and she doesn't know what to do".

I had to bite down on my tongue really, really hard in order not to shout back "SHE KNOWS EXACTLY WHAT TO DO - COME AND GET YOUR BL**DY DOG!".

 

Why are you getting him neutered hon? or considering it? is it for health reasons?
xx